lucky number seven
by Huinari
Summary: She is his dream come true. - Nemu, Mayuri.


**title** : lucky number seven

 **summary** : She is his dream come true. - Nemu, Mayuri

an: I just love Nemu and Mayuri and Akon, and Division 12 in general, former and current.  
an2: Do you know how hard it is trying to find a father-daughter quote that fits Nemu and Mayuri? I gave up because Nemu got shredded ( _spoilers for ch. 643_ ). So, Miku's Sleeping Beauty, since it's sort of fitting.  
an3: Mayuri, I'd really like to believe in your impossibly miraculous science (magic) powers, but your face really killed all my hope.

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 _With your soft voice_  
 _Call my name out_  
 _From behind the window_  
 _Give me your smile_

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7

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Akon glances at the child, who eats without a care for the two men observing her every move. He's heard stories of babies at the age of two – the terrible twos, wasn't it – and he thinks that if every baby was like her, quietly spooning applesauce into her mouth without spilling a single drop or smudging it around her mouth, the world would be a quieter place.

But then again, if every baby was like her, then every parent would be like Captain Kurotsuchi, and the world would most likely be destroyed or driven mad. Possibly both.

"All vitals clear," he reports to the captain, who is staring at the seventh incarnation of the Sleeping Project with an unclear look in his eyes.

"Good, good," the captain mutters, and his voice is uncharacteristically soft, almost dreamlike.

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6

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When Number Seven begins to read at the age of three – surpassing her predecessor's limit – the captain is thrilled. They know he's thrilled because he actually lets the injured members of Division Twelve go to Four for healing.

(Or, he waves them away when they steel themselves for death or a fate far worse, but that means the same thing, anyways.)

The captain documents everything she does, excited at her development. When she falls asleep after carefully drawing a childish portrait of him with crayons, he puts her to bed in an almost careless manner, and then places the piece of paper into file.

But there is a wide grin on his painted face.

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5

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 _The funny thing is_ , Mayuri thinks as he monitors Number Seven's heart rate and brain waves while she sleeps, checking if she is capable of dreaming as she rests _. Blood is our only common factor._

She looks nothing like him. His blood flows in her veins, but that is it. Her dark eyes have heavy lashes, and there is a healthy pallor to her skin that he never had in his youth. Her hair is as dark as her black eyes.

Hell, the fact that she's a girl makes it all the more interesting. It's like she's the exact opposite of him in every way.

Except, of course, the blood.

Her appearance, of course, is something he really doesn't care about. She could be plain, boyish or even a feminine version of him, and the only thing Mayuri would be concerned with would be that she continues to grow and develop, embodying the dream of the death gods.

As long as she lives, she is his masterpiece. His blood, his sweat, the resulting fruit of his labour. He is her creator, she, his daughter in every way that matters to him.

He decides that it'll be amusing to see the reactions of those who hear for the first time that she is his daughter, and can't wait to begin.

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4

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Akon reports that her deductive and analysis abilities have matured greatly.

His Third Seat is uncharacteristically vague on exactly how he knows so, but Mayuri doesn't push or punish the man for it. He knew she'd grow this far.

And of course she would. She is his masterpiece, and she was made to develop, to grow, to learn.

She was made to _live_.

And he will make sure that she will live. That she will survive whatever gets thrown her way and come out victorious and alive, able to continue evolving.

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3

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Some are surprised and outraged when they learn of how her father treats her.

Nemu appreciates the thought and concern – in a distant, faraway part of her mind – but truthfully, she does not mind. She just continues to follow her father and captain in the hopes that if she is useful enough, if she can make him proud enough, he will call her by the name he first called her.

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2

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In the end it is not because Nemu has managed to make him proud, or even happy, that she gets what she wants. She defies orders – in a roundabout way – and makes her own decisions based on her own observations instead of waiting for his word like she usually does.

She decides that he needs a shield. He grabs her by the hair with his one hand and roughly hurls her into a wall.

It is nothing Nemu cannot handle, and she prefers this to falling into the ruined, nerve-ridden ground below and being reduced to scraps of meat.

For the first in a very long, long time –

(it feels that way to her, anyways)

He calls her by the name he bestowed upon her first.

Her heart stutters in surprise because she does not expect it – even for her father, the whimsical, unpredictable man he is, this is something she could not have foreseen – but then, just hearing his voice say it once more, fills with happiness. Even when fierce words are spat her way, and she returns to being 'Nemu', she is still tingling with that joy of being called the beloved name, and rises at his command.

The world as she knows it looks very much like it will end. Even if her father says nothing, Nemu can extrapolate upon current data and analyze it to understand that their chances of victory are very low. Their odds are disastrous.

But her place is here, serving her father.

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1

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The last thing Nemuri Nanagou sees in her moments of burning, invading pain is her father's eyes, still and wide with disbelief.

And then she is no more, reduced to nothing but fragments of a body.

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0

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Mayuri feels like he was rudely woken up from a very pleasant dream – one that he can't go back to, no matter how much he closes his eyes and tries to return to slumber.

It wasn't perfect, no - but it was pleasant. And now it's gone.

Time to face the reality of the waking world, then.

If there is a tinge of despair in his chemical and poison-soaked heart, he moves on without showing any trace of it.

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 _With your soft voice  
_ _Call my name out_  
 _Unmoving in the past_  
 _Time becomes turbulent_

 _._

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 _._


End file.
